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“We’re glad to see you, son.” My father’s eyes are warm and soft, and I raise my glass to mimic his gesture.

“I’m glad to see you, too.” I am. I was nervous about what it would be like to be back here in the place that somehow became our family hub. I didn’t need to be.

My dad had nothing but a warm hug for me and Jules, too.

The kids have inundated her with questions about London and clothes and weather and music. She’s great with them. I don’t know why that surprises me, but it does. I’m not sure what kind of family she wants, or if she wants one at all. I love the idea of a mini Jules running around, but I’d be happy for it to just be us, too.

“So Juliana?—”

“Jules, please,” she corrects with a smile, and I don’t know how I missed the pronunciation she uses that makes it sound like Jewels. Oh my girl, she’s so clever.

“Jules,” my father repeats with an equally warm smile, but his eyes are shrewd and assessing, and I know he’s about to give her a good once-over. “Omar tells us you’re a lawyer.”

She swallows hard. Her eyes dart to me across the table, and in them I see a plea for help. I just give her a reassuring smile. Whatever she wants to tell them is fine. The truth is always scarier in our heads than out loud anyway.

“I’m training to be one,” she starts, her eyes still on mine for a second before she looks back at my dad.

“I see. So you’re in law school?”

“No, I finished. But once that’s done we have to do a vocational training that gives us practical experience. It’s called a pupilage. I’m not quite done with mine.”

“Oh,” Layel sighs, a pout on her face. “So you have to go back to finish.”

Jules puts her glass down and folds her hands in her lap. “I do have to go back, yes, but Omar doesn’t.”

It’s my turn to frown. “No, I don’t. But I will.”

We eye each other in a silent war of wills. We haven’t talked about this at all, and I certainly don’t want to talk about it in front of them.

Layel clears her throat, and Jules snaps her eyes shut for a second. When she opens them again, they’re clear. “I’m sorry. I’m tired and hungry, don’t mind me,” she says with a bright smile that convinces everyone at the table but me that she’s telling the truth. “But really, this place is amazing.”

“You just wait until summer and you’re sweltering. You won’t think so then,” my dad says.

“So how did you two meet?”

“Officially at a party?—”

“Where I turned her down for a dance and then broke her nose.”

Hannah gasps. “What?”

“You make it sound awful,” Jules chides. “He did turn me down when I asked him to dance. But he more than made up for it later.” She smiles at me, and I know she’s remembering our first time. Heat blooms on the back of my neck, and blood rushes to my dick. She knows what she’s doing, and I’ll get her back later.

“What about your nose?”

“I walked up behind him and surprised him. He head butted me. It wasn’t a serious break. I didn’t need surgery or anything. He took me to the hospital and waited while they bandaged me up. And took me home after. But I’d had a crush on him for so long and I finally had my chance, so I left my iPad in his car so he’d have to come back over.”

“Ah, a Chelsea fan, are you?” my father asks knowingly.

“I don’t know a thing about football. I bartend at the pub in his neighborhood. He came in every week, but we’d never spoken. I didn’t work up the nerve until the night we ended up at a mutual friend’s party.”

I cover her hand with mine. “And once I got an up-close taste of perfection, I knew I’d never have enough.”

“Oh, Omar…” She turns the hand under mine over and links our fingers, and we share a smile. I wish I could bottle this feeling—the contentment in her eyes matches what I feel down to my soul. I hope like hell this lead we’re chasing pans out. But if this doesn’t, if it takes forever, I’ll try forever, because she deserves to live in the same sunshine she shines on all of us.

I shake my head and pull her to me, and her warm body comforts and calms me as she nestles into my chest, burrowing her nose into the space between my pecs where my heart beats for her and the rest of the people I love. I cup the back of her head and press a kiss to the top of it.

“So why’d you say no when she asked you to dance?”